XO - re chickenshit vs chickenfeed

[Michael Tee]

I read some of Trillin's stuff, mostly in the New Yorker magazine.    I thought of it as mostly easy reading, not deep, not life-changing, sort of like a long letter from a friend.  His memoirs of growing up Jewish were kind of boring to me, because they were too much like my own life.  I guess what I kept reading them for was the thrill of recognition - - oh yeah!  that's just what it was like!  or, yes!  I had an aunt and uncle who were just like that! or, but that's EXACTLY what my own mum used to say!  He had a kind of arch, detached, above-it-all style of narration that looks like it's easy to write, but is actually very difficult.  It seems to be almost a prerequisite for getting into the New Yorker, although some writers (Junot Diaz, Sapphire, et al.,) can get in without it if they have their own unique, distinctive style.

[Xavier_Onassis]

I was specifically thinking about Messages from My Father and Family Man.

Not being Jewish, Trillin seemed sort of like a Jewish version of myself. I have been reading him since he was in the Nation and the Saturday Review. He has a friendly style of writing that is in some way like Vonnegut.

[Plane]

I was just recently an adult when I read "Only in America"  and "For Two Cents Plain"
I admire the easy reading highly descriptive style he had.

One felt as if one weree familiar with the scene he described , even when he was describing a scene I was too young to ever have seen.